


When You're Older

by cloudwaucher



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Adventure, Agender Character, Friendship, Gen, Self-Insert, slight AU
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-01-09
Updated: 2020-09-01
Packaged: 2021-02-27 07:22:20
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 16,485
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22193236
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cloudwaucher/pseuds/cloudwaucher
Summary: The date is September 1, 1991. An eighteen-year-old college student wakes up at King's Cross Station in the body of a child. In their pocket is a wooden stick, seven gold coins, and a letter inviting them to attend Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry.When a lost, messy-haired boy with a snowy owl wanders into view, the choice becomes clear: help him or leave things be.Sam chooses to help him.In which a self-insert OC intends to make things better, but finds that not everything is the same as what was written in the books.
Comments: 27
Kudos: 172





	1. All Aboard!

In the bustling heart of King’s Cross, a young boy named Harry Potter felt very small and very lost as he searched high and low for platform nine and three-quarters. He was sure it had to be here, between platforms nine and ten, but it was getting closer and closer to eleven o’ clock and he still had not found it.

He was just about to ask one of the station guards for directions when a gentle tap on his shoulder captured his attention. Harry turned and came face-to-face with a boy around his age and nearly a head taller with short black hair and dark, sparkling eyes. 

The boy smiled. He had a rather kind face.

“Hello. Sorry, I just thought you looked a little lost,” he said. He spoke with an American accent, something Harry had never heard before in person. “Do you need help?”

“Well, yes…” Harry hesitated, wondering how he could explain about platform nine and three-quarters without sounding utterly bonkers.

Unbidden, his eyes wandered towards the trunk on the boy’s trolley cart. It resembled his own, only it had various stickers—dragons, unicorns, and pumpkins—decorating its surface.

The boy grinned knowingly. “Hogwarts? Are you also a first-year?”

“Yes!” Harry said, practically sagging with relief. “Do you know how to get to platform nine and three-quarters?”

“Of course. Follow me, it’s right here.”

The boy led him to the barrier between platforms nine and ten. He made a sweeping gesture, as if to usher Harry straight towards it.

Harry stared incredulously. Was the boy having him on?

“It’s magic,” the boy said upon seeing Harry’s disbelieving face. “You just walk through it.”

Still, Harry hesitated. He could think of nothing more humiliating than crashing head first into a wall in the middle of a busy station. Going to school with Dudley had taught him that boys would always be mean and nasty when they felt like it, so he was reluctant to trust in this complete stranger.

The boy sighed at Harry’s blatant wariness, but nonetheless smiled.

“Okay, then. I’ll go first,” he said.

He lined up his trolley and, with an easy confidence, pushed it straight towards the barrier at a brisk march. Boy and trolley soon disappeared from sight.

Wide-eyed, Harry glanced around, but no one seemed to have noticed the boy’s disappearance. If anything, the people passing by seemed to be steadfastly ignoring Harry, when before they had looked at him oddly for loitering at the station with an owl in a cage.

Deciding to just get on with it, Harry gathered his courage and rushed the barrier at full speed, his eyes tightly closed. A large part of him expected to smash into it, despite the other boy’s example, so he was surprised and relieved when the impact never came.

Harry opened his eyes and was instantly rewarded with the sight of the most wondrous, bright-red steam engine steadily puffing out clouds of smoke as it readied to embark on its journey. The platform around it was packed with a colorful assortment of magical things and people. Harry greedily drank in the sights and sounds, swiveling his head this way and that to take in as much as possible.

The boy who had helped him find the entrance stood nearby, sporting a similar expression of wonder.

“I’m beginning to think I’m dead,” the boy muttered, seemingly to himself. 

Harry did the polite thing and pretended not to hear.

In unspoken agreement, the two of them made their way down the platform together. They helped each other heft their heavy trunks onto the train, which left both of them sweaty and tired as they collapsed onto opposite seats in the only unoccupied compartment they’d found.

“I’m Sam, by the way,” the boy said, smiling.

Sam stuck out his hand and Harry eagerly shook it, wondering if this was how friends were made.

“I’m Harry. Harry Potter.”

“It’s nice to meet you, Harry. You’re pretty famous here.”

“But not where you’re from? You’re an American, right?” Harry asked.

“Right. Well, I’ve heard of you for sure, but I don’t think you mean the same thing in the U.S. since we didn’t actually have to deal with Voldemort.”

“My friend Hagrid says you shouldn’t say that name,” Harry said, even though he often forgot that rule himself.

Sam smiled again. He seemed to do that a lot. 

“I know, but I guess I don’t want to be afraid of a name.”

Harry nodded. That made a certain amount of sense. Although, on the other hand, he’d seen how unsettled Hagrid had become after just whispering that name. Maybe it was better not to upset anyone with it.

“Is it very different in the States? Magic, I mean,” said Harry.

“No, not really. I’m…not the best person to ask about that,” Sam replied slowly, looking unsure for the first time. It was quickly replaced by another smile. “I’ve read a few books about Magical Britain, though. I know how things work around here, for the most part.”

Hearing this, Harry began to feel like maybe he didn’t belong after all. Aside from what Hagrid had told him, he didn’t know much at all about magic, American or British. Sam, a foreigner, probably knew far more than Harry, who had lived here since birth.

“I was raised by, er, Muggles. I don’t know anything about the wizarding world,” he mumbled.

“That’s fine. Really,” Sam rushed to assure him. “All the Muggle-born have that learning curve.” He paused. “We call Muggles _No-Majes_ in the States. ‘No magic,’ get it? Anyway, it’s nothing to be ashamed about. I have a feeling you’ll do great.”

Harry had to smile a bit at Sam’s earnest expression. The other boy was very easy to talk to. They fell into a relaxed conversation about what Harry had learned so far and speculated on what other wonders lay in wait for them at Hogwarts.

Suddenly, the floor lurched and Harry realized the train was leaving the station. He and Sam pressed their noses against the glass, watching the platform and its inhabitants get left behind.

The compartment door slid open and a redheaded boy with a black smudge on his nose stepped in.

“You mind if I sit here?” he asked. “Everywhere else is full.”

Harry shook his head and Sam made a welcoming hand motion, so the boy happily took a seat next to Harry.

Before any of them could speak, the door opened again. Two identical older boys, also with red hair, poked their heads in.

“Hey, Ron,” said one of the twins. 

“Listen,” said the other, “we’re going down the middle of the train—Lee Jordan’s got a giant tarantula down there.”

“Right,” mumbled the boy, Ron.

“Are you first-years too?” the first twin asked, glancing between Harry and Sam.

Without waiting for an answer, the second one added, “We hope you’re prepared to wrestle the troll.”

“Remember to mind the teeth. After all, their favorite food is small children!”

“Do try not to get stepped on! And they stink, so hold your breath!”

Sam laughed along with the twins, even as Harry and Ron paled.

“See you later, then. Bye, Ron, other firsties!”

“We’ll be rooting for you!” 

The twins left, closing the door behind them. The compartment was quiet in their wake.

“Well, they seem nice,” Sam said after a while. He extended a hand towards Ron. “I’m Sam, by the way.”

He and Ron shook. Then Ron turned and shook Harry’s hand.

“My name’s Ron Weasley. Those were my brothers, Fred and George.”

“I’m Harry Potter,” said Harry.

Ron gaped at him, eyes wide as saucers. “You’re Harry Potter? Really? Can I see your you-know-what?”

He pointed at Harry’s forehead.

Harry obliged and swept his fringe to the side, revealing his lightning bolt scar.

“Blimey. Did it hurt?”

“I don’t remember. I was a baby when it happened,” Harry answered.

Ron nodded, continuing to stare at Harry’s forehead.

“Well!” Sam exclaimed, clapping his hands together and startling the two other boys. “Ron, why don’t you tell us a bit about yourself? Or your brothers. I’m assuming they’re twins?”

So Ron tore his gaze away from Harry’s famous scar and began regaling them with outlandish stories about the twins, who were quite the practical jokers. He went on to tell them about the rest of his family as well.

It turned out that Ron had more than two brothers—five, to be exact, all older than him—and a younger sister as well. This left Ron with all their old things, including Charlie’s old wand and Percy’s old rat. Ginny, his sister, was the only girl, so their parents bought her new clothes instead of requiring her to wear her brothers’ hand-me-downs. Ron seemed a little bitter when he explained that.

As the cityscapes gave way to the broad English countryside outside their window, Harry was content to simply sit back and listen. Ron had obviously been surrounded by magic his entire life and the things he talked about were wondrous and fascinating.

At one point, they were interrupted by a kindly woman selling sweets from a trolley. Harry, who had never been able to purchase anything for himself before, leapt up at the opportunity and bought some of everything.

Sam also approached the cart and it was here that Harry began to realize his new friend was a little…strange.

“Excuse me,” Sam began, holding up a Pumpkin Pasty to the trolley witch, “do these really explode?”

The woman frowned in polite confusion. “Whatever do you mean, my dear?”

Sam grimaced and said, “Um, actually, never mind.”

He sat back down with a look of faint consternation.

Deciding not to dwell on Sam's behavior, Harry then insisted on sharing his spoils with his two companions. They steadily made their way through the mountain of magical sweets (though Sam pointedly avoided the Pumpkin Pasties for whatever reason).

They were in the middle of tasting the Every Flavor Beans, making a game out of it, when the compartment door slid open to reveal a teary-eyed boy with a round face.

“Sorry,” he said, “but have you seen a toad at all?”

Harry and Ron shook their heads. Sam said, “Maybe you should ask a prefect for help.”

With a mumbled thanks and a miserable expression, the boy left.

“I had a toad once,” said Sam as soon as the door closed. “I caught it myself in the woods with my bare hands. Named it Dolores.”

“Why Dolores?” Ron asked.

Sam shrugged. “Just seems like a very toady name.”

“Did it do anything neat?”

“Not that I knew. It died in, like, a day.”

“Why? What happened to it?” asked Harry, aghast.

“Oh. Um, I trapped it in a bucket and forgot about it, so it probably starved.”

Sam smiled sheepishly while Harry and Ron stared at him in horror.

“In my defense, I was only eight at the time and had no idea what toads needed to survive,” he added.

Harry and Ron’s horror abated somewhat. Still, poor Dolores.

The compartment door slid open again.

“Has anyone seen a toad? Neville’s lost one,” said a girl with large, bushy hair. She was already wearing her Hogwarts robes. Her two front teeth were significantly larger than the others, reminding Harry of a beaver.

Beside her was the timid boy with the missing toad. It seemed he’d found some help, though the girl looked a bit young to be a prefect.

“We’ve already told him we haven’t seen it,” Ron said.

“Oh, well,” the girl said with a sigh. “Thank you for your time anyway. I’m Hermione Granger. This is Neville and his toad’s name is Trevor. Could you let us know if you see him?”

“Sure,” said Harry, but the girl and the boy were already moving on to the next compartment.

“All this fuss over a toad?” Ron wondered aloud. “At least I won’t have the worst pet at school. Can’t say Scabbers is much of an improvement anyway.”

Sam’s face took on a rather severe pallor as he stared at the fat, gray rat sitting in Ron’s lap.

“I’d rather… _not_ talk about your rat,” he said queasily.

Instead of taking offense, Ron just nodded in a resigned sort of agreement.

They settled into their previous game of guessing Bertie Bott flavors. Ron, having eaten these sweets all his life, knew many of the flavors on sight and Sam often cheated by asking his opinion. Harry, on the other hand, found he liked taking chances. He gobbled down an ordinary-looking red bean, which soon turned out _not_ to be cherry, as he had thought, but rather chili pepper. It was incredibly spicy.

When their compartment door opened yet again, a red-faced Harry was still fanning his open mouth, his eyes watering and snot trickling from his nostrils.

Three boys came in. The one in the middle was staring at Harry with intense scrutiny. Harry recognized him as the pale boy from Madam Malkin’s. 

“So…” The pale boy cleared his throat. “You’re Harry Potter?”

Harry nodded wordlessly. A tear slid down his face.

“Well, I’m Draco. Draco Malfoy.”

Ron coughed, though it sounded more like a laugh. Draco turned to him with a scowl, but then Harry sniffled and panted and wiped his nose with his sleeve, drawing all attention back to himself.

The pale boy seemed to grow increasingly uncomfortable as Harry continued to leak fluids from his face. The two other boys with Draco, who looked much too large and mean for their age, just blinked stupidly at the peculiar sight.

“Are—are you all right?” Draco asked, his composure crumbling away.

Harry shook his head, not trusting himself to speak, for his mouth still felt very much on fire.

Draco winced and took a step back. “That’s too bad. I suppose I’ll see you around, then, Potter.”

He left in a hurry with his two bodyguards lumbering close behind.

Not even ten seconds after their visitors had gone, Sam burst into raucous laughter.

“You…you thought…it was _cherry!_ ” he wheezed out between helpless giggles. “And you scared him away…by crying!”

Ron soon joined in with loud guffaws, and even fell off his seat to roll around on the floor. As for Harry, he glared playfully at them both, though the effect was ruined when he had to wipe his nose again. It was odd; they were laughing at him, but all he felt was a giddy happiness that seemed to reach all the way down to his soul.

The laughter eventually petered out. The burning in Harry’s mouth dulled to an acceptable ache. A comfortable silence settled between the three of them as the train drew ever nearer to its destination. Harry looked out the window and marveled at the palette of colors cast onto the clouds by the setting sun. It really was beautiful.

“I’m looking forward to Hogwarts,” he said without thinking.

Ron sighed happily. “Me too.”

“Me three,” agreed Sam with a smile. “Let’s hope we don’t die.”

Harry figured he was joking.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Just a story that's been in my head for quite a while. I know self-inserts are kind of an eye roll, but I already have everything planned out and not writing it would be a waste. Let's see if I can get myself to actually finish something for once. Also, still getting a feel for this site, so bear with me with all this tagging stuff.
> 
> Thanks for reading!


	2. Welcome to Hogwarts

Harry watched with growing concern as the minutes ticked by and Sam had yet to be sorted by the Sorting Hat. Under the enchanted ceiling of the Great Hall, the students’ whispers rose into murmurs, then outright chattering.

Despite being one of the tallest first years, Sam looked tiny under the broad-brimmed hat with Professor McGonagall standing proud beside him. Harry wondered if he himself had seemed just as small during his turn under the Hat, which had put him in Gryffindor after a brief deliberation between all four Houses.

The combined attentions of the students, professors, and ghosts didn’t seem to faze Sam in the slightest. He sat there with an unfalteringly pleasant smile, idly swinging his legs.

Ron nudged Harry with his foot. “Why do you reckon it’s taking so long?” he asked from across the table.

Harry could only shrug. He was ever so glad that Ron had also been sorted into Gryffindor, but felt it would be even better if Sam could join them. Unfortunately, it was looking less and less likely that this would be the case.

Finally, after nearly ten minutes, the Hat’s mouth-like tear opened and it bellowed, “GRYFFINDOR!” for the entire school to hear.

Harry and Ron were the first to start cheering and the last to stop.

Sam made his way down to the Gryffindor table, still sporting a vague smile, as Professor McGonagall put away the Sorting Hat and the stool. Harry waved him over.

“What a rude hat. Shouted right in my ear,” Sam remarked dryly, taking the seat Harry had saved for him.

“Why were you under there for so long?” Ron asked.

At that, Sam made an odd face. He paused a bit longer than was normal.

“The Hat made me realize I had to…ask myself a few things,” he eventually said.

“What things?” Ron persisted.

“Oh, you know—personal things. Self-introspection.”

Harry didn’t know what that meant. A glance at Ron showed that he didn’t know either.

Before they could question Sam further, the Great Hall quieted down. Harry followed everyone’s gazes to the staff table, where Headmaster Albus Dumbledore had stood up, beaming at his students.

“Welcome!” he said. “Welcome to a new year at Hogwarts! Before we begin our banquet, I would like to say a few words. And here they are: Nitwit! Blubber! Oddment! Tweak! Thank you!”

He sat back down and the tables were suddenly laden with food. Harry’s jaw dropped at the sheer _variety_ laid before his eyes. He numbly accepted a dish of potatoes from Percy, one of Ron’s brothers and a prefect.

Everyone began to tuck in. Not needing any further encouragement, Harry helped himself to all that Hogwarts had to offer. His plate was soon piled high with his favorite foods. In his head, he smirked at the Dursleys. If only they could see him now! Dudley would be drooling with jealousy.

The conversation around him at some point turned to ghosts. Seamus Finnigan, one of the other first-year Gryffindors, was talking to the aptly named Nearly Headless Nick. Harry listened intently, more than a little curious about the spectral figures floating around the hall. 

“How did he get covered in blood?” asked Seamus, staring at the Bloody Baron, the blood-splattered ghost at the Slytherin table.

“I’ve never asked,” said Sir Nicholas.

Unexpectedly, Sam chose that moment to chime in.

“The woman he loved didn’t love him back,” he said casually while carving off a chicken leg. “When she ran away from home, he went to get her, but she wouldn’t go back with him, so he got mad and killed her with a knife, then killed himself in guilt. That’s why he’s covered in blood.”

The surrounding students and Sir Nicholas all fell silent and stared at him. 

“Er…is that really what happened?” asked Dean Thomas, another first year.

Sam shrugged and continued to eat his chicken leg.

“Aren’t you an American?” said Hermione Granger, leaning towards him with bright, questioning eyes. “How would _you_ know about a ghost in Scotland?”

“Read about it in a book.”

“Which one? I’ve read all our books for the year and none of them so much as mention the Bloody Baron. Oh, but he’s in _Hogwarts: A History_ . There’s nothing about _how_ he died, though. I don’t see how you can know something that isn’t even in _the_ book about Hogwarts.”

Sam looked at her with…amusement? Harry couldn’t be sure, but Sam didn’t seem at all annoyed by Hermione’s doubt.

“Even if I told you the title, you wouldn’t be able to find it. There aren’t any copies of it anywhere in the world.”

“How can that be? And if that’s true, then how did you read it? You’re not making any sense!”

Sam grinned at her, waving the chicken leg like a wand. “Magic!” he said.

Hermione crossed her arms and huffed.

When it became apparent that Sam had no more to say on the matter, everyone returned to what they’d been doing before. Harry got to know his Housemates better and helped himself to two servings of treacle tart.

Aside from a brief incident in which he caught the eye of Professor Snape and received a piercing pain from his lightning bolt scar, Harry thoroughly enjoyed the rest of the feast. He felt as though he’d eaten more food in this one setting than he’d eaten in the entire rest of his life. It was immensely satisfying. Not even Seamus’s horrendous, off-key rendition of the school song had dampened his mood.

When Dumbledore dismissed them and everyone began to file out of the hall, Harry and Ron noticed Sam lingering back near the table and sent him a few questioning looks.

“I have to go speak with Headmaster Dumbledore,” Sam explained in a low voice once the others had moved farther ahead.

“Why?” asked Ron. “Are you in trouble?”

“I hope not. There were some…extenuating circumstances surrounding my enrollment at Hogwarts and I need to make sure everything’s all hunky-dory. Might take a while, so don’t wait up for me, ‘kay?”

Harry nodded and watched Sam stride towards the staff table, before turning to join the rest of the Gryffindor first years. They followed Percy in a winding trek through the castle, passing moving paintings and shiny suits of armor, slipping into hidden passages, and even encountering Peeves the Poltergeist at the top of a staircase. Finally, they reached a portrait of a fat lady, which swung open at a password to reveal the entrance to the Gryffindor common room.

At the top of yet another staircase was the boys’ dormitory. Harry claimed one of the five four-poster beds and marveled at the smooth mattress and soft sheets. After brushing his teeth and changing into his pajamas, he burrowed under the covers, feeling safe and warm for the first time in a long time.

“Goodnight, Ron,” he whispered through the bed drapes.

“‘Night, Harry.”

Just before drifting off to sleep, he managed to wish Sam a good night as well.

* * *

When you got to be as old as Albus Dumbledore, surprises of the benevolent persuasion became a rare commodity. Yet on this joyous first of September, he had been pleasantly surprised by the number of pleasant surprises throughout the evening. The House-elves had added peppermint humbugs to the main course and the Weasley twins were clearly broadening their musical horizons. He’d even found, quite by accident, a delightful combination of pork chops, gravy, peas, cinnamon, treacle, and turnip ice cream that had caused Pomona to turn a delicate shade of green when he’d encouraged her to taste it. 

Perhaps the most interesting surprise of the night had come from the one student who had stood out most amongst the others. Bizarrely enough, it wasn’t Harry Potter.

Hogwarts had received its twenty-first Hatstall in the form of Sam Zhao, who had sat under the Sorting Hat for exactly nine and three-quarters of a minute. That same student had marched up to the High Table after dinner and politely demanded to see the headmaster in private. Needless to say, Albus had humored the child, despite Professor McGonagall’s protests. 

He had assumed they would discuss the matter of Sam Zhao’s international status, a rather silly thing to assume in hindsight. He ought to have known better—one did not become Headmaster of Hogwarts by assuming things of his students.

After all, “international” was far too tame a word for the situation.

“I believe,” Albus said, and he was fighting the urge to rub his eyes, “that will be all for tonight. It is rather late and I’m afraid I tire more quickly than I used to.”

The one sitting across from him merely nodded at his lackluster excuse. Albus took a moment to marvel at what magic had brought before him. Here was a child who was not a child, a step past the age of majority and still so young. A traveler, lost and with no way home.

“Just one more thing.”

“Certainly, dear child.”

It was the traveler’s dark eyes that reminded him: no, not a child. They seemed to bore down to Albus’s very soul and he could admit to himself that he wanted to think they approved of what they saw.

“I know a lot about you,” the traveler spoke with gravitas. “Or at least, I think I do. Look, I don’t want you to _care_ about me like you care about, say, Harry. If this is going to work, we need to…understand each other.”

Albus had already foreseen this avenue of conversation. There was still so much the traveler had not told him, secrets and mysteries that Albus doubted he could unravel on his own. The cards were not in his hands and they never would be if he didn’t play along.

“You’d like us to be equals, then?” he asked, knowing the answer, playing the game.

A laugh. “Well, _yeah_.” This was said with an accompanying eye roll, as though the notion were so blatant that it should have stated itself. “But that’s not what I meant. This all-knowing grandfatherly thing of yours? Not my style. I’d rather skip all the awkward stuff and just be friends.”

Oh.

Friends.

Strange, how one word could light such a fire of hope in his old heart. Albus Dumbledore had no shortage of friends, true, but how many of them had offered first, without prompting, with only bold trust and candor in their eyes? One, of course, a boy with ambitions too great for this world; two, a phoenix wreathed in flames; now three, a stranger from the strangest of lands.

Perhaps he’d been playing the game for so long that he’d forgotten how to recognize the truth.

“Friends,” said Albus, testing the word on his tongue. “I see now. Yes, I think I’d like that too.”

And with this clarity, it was as though a great weight had been lifted from his shoulders. The ever-resplendent Fawkes trilled in excitement from his golden perch. His phoenix song wrapped around the room, the soaring notes rousing the portraits of the former headmasters and headmistresses of Hogwarts from their slumber.

Sam leaned forward, holding out a hand, palm facing upwards. A promise, maybe, or an invitation for an adventure into the great unknown.

Albus took it and smiled.

* * *

It was Friday morning in the Great Hall. A familiar snowy owl landed next to Harry’s breakfast and dropped an envelope onto his plate.

“Why, hello there,” he said to Hedwig as she preened.

He stroked her feathers as he opened his mail. Inside the envelope was a note from Hagrid, inviting Harry to have tea with him in the afternoon. Harry hastily scribbled out an acceptance and watched Hedwig take off with it.

“Ugh,” said the zombie that greatly resembled Sam.

Ron, who had apparently at some point become fluent in zombie-speak, nodded knowingly. “You don’t have to tell me, mate. Didn’t get a wink of sleep,” he said, procuring a plate of fried eggs. “Go on. How many points are you planning on earning today?”

As they had discovered over the past four days, their friend Sam was something of a genius. He could understand everything the first time it was explained and took to their practical lessons quicker and better than anyone else. Even Professor McGonagall had been stunned speechless during Transfiguration, when Sam had turned his matchstick into a perfect needle on his first try.

He was humble about it too, in a roundabout sort of way.

“I’m only smart ‘cause I’m eighteen,” he’d once said, to everyone’s great bewilderment. “If you compare me to other eighteen-year-olds, I’m really nothing special. You’ll catch up to me in no time.”

Sam was even nice enough to assist anyone who needed help if the professor was busy with another student. Having him in the common room was like having a private tutor. 

Unfortunately, through these actions, he had somehow earned the ire of one Hermione Granger, who had been relegated to second-best in spite of her fervent hand-raising in class. She seemed to take personal offense at Sam’s competence and constantly snubbed his many offers of friendship. Sam hadn’t given up yet, but Harry figured it was a lost cause.

Ron’s question had elicited a barely-audible grumble from Sam, who cast a baleful glare around the hall as though blaming his fellow students for the early hour.

“I’m not awake enough to talk about points,” said Sam. He blindly stabbed at his toast with a spoon. “Or anything, really. What was your name again? Roonil Wazlib?”

Ron snorted. “You’re a laugh. All right, what about Potions, then? Got any last tips?”

Sam’s spoon bent in half. “Ron, I just spent _all of last night_ giving you tips for Potions. What more do you _want_ from me?”

Ron frowned, but didn’t reply. He ducked his head and shoveled food into his mouth with steely determination. Harry put on a cheery smile to ease the tension, but neither of his friends noticed his efforts.

The situation was that Ron had been worrying about Snape’s class all week, made worse by his twin brothers taking turns telling him horror stories about their past Potions lessons every chance they got. Ron’s worrying had become so bad, in fact, that Sam had taken it upon himself to host an emergency study session in the common room just for him. Naturally, this had ended up with nearly all the first-year Gryffindors huddled around Sam late at night, eagerly answering Potions questions for rewards of Chocolate Frogs and Licorice Wands. 

(Harry had won two of the offered sweets for being the first to look up the many names for aconite and where to find a bezoar. Lavender Brown had won _ten_ , which was frankly unfair.)

It hadn’t occurred to Harry that Sam would be so tired. Harry felt fine, maybe a bit sleepy, but Sam looked _exhausted_. They’d gone up to bed at around the same time, hadn’t they? Maybe Sam just needed more sleep than everyone else. Dudley was the same, except worse in every way.

Breakfast passed without another word. All too soon, they were seated with the Slytherins in a classroom in the dungeons listening to the Potions master’s silky voice as he called roll.

Snape paused after Parvati Patil’s name.

“Ah, _yes_ ,” he said. “Harry Potter, our new… _celebrity_.”

Harry knew right then and there that Snape would be out to make this Potions classroom a living hell for the rest of Harry’s Hogwarts days. This soon proved to be true when, after a rather dramatic speech about the art of potions, Snape suddenly fixed Harry with his cold, black eyes.

“Potter! What would I get if I added powdered root of asphodel to an infusion of wormwood?”

Harry froze, but only because he had to resist a triumphant smile. He knew this; Sam had specifically pointed this out last night!

“Those are key ingredients in the Draught of Living Death, sir.”

Snape seemed taken aback, but soon recovered with a horrible smirk. “A lucky guess. How about this: Where would you look if I told you to find me a bezoar?”

Harry had to bite his lip to keep from grinning like a loon. _Keep it together, Potter. Keep it together_ , he repeated to himself in his mind.

“In the stomach of a goat, sir.”

Snape’s eyes narrowed in a frightful way. If he hadn’t hated Harry before, he certainly did now. Funny that Ron had been so right about this class, just not in the way he’d been expecting.

“So,” said Snape very quietly, “it seems you can actually _read_ , Potter.”

He turned to the rest of the class.

“Well? Why aren’t you all writing that down?” he snapped.

Everyone scrambled for their quills, even the Gryffindors that had already memorized this knowledge thanks to Sam’s last-minute tutelage. Harry chanced sharing a pleased grin with Ron, who was looking rather relieved. That extra studying had paid off after all. Sam was a lifesaver!

Snape started them working in pairs on the boils cure, prowling around the classroom and dispensing scathing remarks all the while.

At one point, Harry glanced up to see Snape looming over his cauldron. He heard Ron gulp.

“Potter,” said the professor with disdain. “What are—”

“Excuse me, professor?”

All heads turned towards Sam, who had his hand raised. He was seated behind Harry and Ron, partnered up with a nervous Neville Longbottom.

Snape sneered. “Yes, Mister Zhao?”

“I was just wondering—earlier, why did you ask Harry about the Draught of Living Death? It’s a very advanced potion.”

Snape’s sneer became…sneerier. “How I teach this class is not for you to question, Mister Zhao.”

“But, sir, I’m a student. It’s exactly my place to question _you_ , a teacher.”

“I suppose you think yourself very clever,” Snape snarled. “That’ll be five points from Gryffindor for your cheek.”

Sam laid a hand on his cheek, batting his eyelashes.

“What’s wrong with my cheek, sir?” he asked innocently. 

Several students laughed, including some of the Slytherins.

“ _Ten_ points, Mister Zhao! And not another word from you for the rest of this period!”

Sam nodded, looking properly contrite, but as soon as Snape’s back was turned, his lips quirked into a wry smile. He caught Harry’s troubled glance and winked.

Bemused, Harry turned to face the front of the classroom again. Every once in a while, it seemed that Snape would walk past and try to say something, but a yell or a splash from a different part of the classroom would distract him. Harry had a feeling this was not a coincidence, though he didn’t know how anyone could orchestrate all those accidents without Snape catching on.

The end of the lesson could not have come soon enough. Once again, Sam had come through for the Gryffindors, as most of their potions came out quite well. Of the Slytherins, only Malfoy and Goyle’s potion was of an equal caliber. Snape nonetheless managed to find numerous faults in the brewing technique of nearly everyone else. (Sam and Neville’s potion, for all that Snape had glared, was absolutely perfect.)

After class, Hermione rounded on Sam the moment they were out of the dungeons.

“You cost us fifteen points in the span of less than a minute!” she accused. 

Sam, who always had this amused look on his face when speaking with Hermione, dismissed her furious scowl with a wave of his hand.

“Relax. I’ll make them up in another class. Fifteen points won’t matter in the long run.”

“I’m more concerned about your blatant disrespect towards Professor Snape! You were _deliberately_ provoking him, I know it!”

Sam simply laughed, then turned from her to ask Ron, “Wasn’t so bad, right?”

Ron shrugged sheepishly. “Could’ve been better. But yeah.”

“Told you. So, what’s the plan for the afternoon?”

“I’m having tea with Hagrid,” said Harry. “Do you two want to come along?”

“Sure.”

They walked away.

* * *

The muffled sounds of enthusiastic crunching filled the Headmaster’s Office later that evening.

“But I saw the newspaper,” said Sam, obliviously sprinkling biscuit crumbs onto the carpet. “And Hagrid was all shifty about it at tea today.”

“Be that as it may,” Albus replied with a hint of mirth (and a discreet wave of his wand to vanish the crumbs), “it does not change the fact that the Philosopher’s Stone is safe with the Flamels—as it has always been—and far from Hogwarts.”

Sam hummed, drumming nimble fingers against the armrest, a clear sign of contemplation. In front of the crackling fire, between their two armchairs, was a table that held a wide assortment of biscuits. A large mug had made its home in Sam's hand, more than half full with hot cocoa. Albus now watched as his newest friend absently devoured four or five biscuits in rapid succession.

“I can live with that,” Sam finally decided. Another biscuit vanished. “So what was in the vault, then?”

Albus sat back and schooled his features into a stern mask. "What I am about to tell you is of the utmost secrecy," he said very seriously.

“You say that,” returned Sam, unimpressed, “but your eyes are twinkling, so I’m guessing there’s a punchline.”

They had agreed on Friday night meetings for the simple reason that mornings were out of the question and Friday night was as good a night as any other. However, it now occurred to Albus that having their meeting after the stress of an entire week might not be ideal for either of them. Sam did not even seem to have a sense of humor anymore, which was a great tragedy for them all.

Suppressing a childish pout, Albus graciously relented to Sam’s line of questioning and explained, “The object Hagrid retrieved from Gringotts is a powerful archive of knowledge of the culinary craft, most generously lent to Hogwarts so that we may, from time to time, revolutionize our menu so as to not become too boring for our students’ tastes.”

Sam blinked twice, then blinked again for good measure. “You’re telling me you ‘covertly’ sent Hagrid, the most conspicuous of your many associates, to a bank guarded by goblins and enchantments and dragons…to fetch a _cookbook?_ ”

“It’s a _recipe journal_ ,” Albus huffed. “Nicolas and Perenelle find ways to keep themselves busy and sometimes they like to share with close friends. Is that so wrong?”

Sam made a placating gesture. “Yeah, yeah, okay. Explains why Voldemort thinks you have the Stone. I just don’t get why you’re making this all secretive and stuff.”

“Well of course!” Albus exclaimed, surprised that Sam would be so dense. “What would the people of Magical Britain think if they knew Hogwarts took its culinary cues from an elderly French couple? Imagine the papers, the scandal!”

Sam sprayed out a mouthful of cocoa and proceeded to howl with laughter.

* * *

“You’ve forgotten something,” said Dean.

His words were more than unnecessary, as they could all plainly see the crimson smoke billowing within Neville’s Remembrall.

“Yeah,” said Sam with a sigh. “I probably have.”

He handed the ball back to Neville. It stayed bright red. Neville frowned.

“It’s a bit useless, innit?” said Seamus. “Doesn’t even tell you what you’ve forgotten.”

Everyone gave Neville a few pitying glances.

Just then, Draco Malfoy passed by and tried to snatch the Remembrall from Neville’s hand. Luckily, Harry noticed in time and caught Malfoy’s wrist.

“What are you doing?” Harry asked, glaring.

Malfoy yanked his arm free. “Nothing. Just wanted to see what all the fuss was about.”

“Well, it’s a Remembrall. Neville’s gran got it for him.” Right after he said it, Harry felt rather silly for explaining this to Malfoy, of all people.

“Oh, _those_ ,” Malfoy drawled. “Useless things. Rather perfect for Longbottom, wouldn’t you say?”

Harry angrily rose to his feet, and Seamus shouted, “They’re plenty useful!”

Malfoy turned up his nose. “By all means, go ahead and play with the useless trinket. See if I care.”

With a departing sneer, he strutted away, followed (as always) by Crabbe and Goyle.

Ron shook his head as Harry sat back down. “My dad says the Malfoys are bad news. Worked for You-Know-Who and got away with it. Of course Malfoy Junior’s going to be a Dark wizard too.”

That drew a snort from Sam. “Don’t be so harsh, Ron. Draco’s just jealous. He might get lots of candy, but his parents don’t send him any ‘trinkets’ and he felt left out.”

“You’re always defending Malfoy,” Neville said. His voice held a bite of accusation. “I don’t know why. He’s mean.”

Neville’s words brought a moment of uncomfortable silence among their group. Malfoy liked to make fun of anyone who wasn’t a Slytherin, especially Neville, Hermione, and the Hufflepuffs. Whoever tried to confront him also had to face Crabbe and Goyle, who were big and scary and liked to crack their knuckles.

The thing was, Sam never seemed bothered by Malfoy’s behavior. As far as Harry knew, the two weren’t friends and Sam didn’t quite _defend_ Malfoy, yet still tended to provide unhelpful explanations about why they shouldn’t get worked up about him or any of the other Slytherins.

“I’m not defending him,” Sam said, unbothered, “but I’m not going to insult him either. Knowing why he does the things he does makes you realize he’s just a spoiled, obnoxious brat who doesn’t actually know any better. He’s a sloppy caricature of his parents, dutifully spouting their rhetoric like a good little mindless parrot. Listening to anything he says is a colossal waste of time.”

They all stared at him.

“Did you really say, ‘I’m not going to insult him’…?” began Ron, a disbelieving grin sneaking across his face.

“Haven’t you heard? ‘Spoiled, obnoxious brat’ isn’t an insult; it’s a compliment!” said Seamus, equally delighted.

“And so is ‘sloppy caricature of his parents,’ whatever _that_ means,” said Dean.

“I liked ‘good little mindless parrot,’ myself,” Neville added shyly.

“Well, I think we can all agree that ‘colossal waste of time’ is the nicest thing Sam’s ever said about anyone,” finished Harry.

Sam sighed, pushed away his breakfast, and said, “I hate you all.”

And like a dam had burst, they dissolved into laughter, ignoring Sam’s repeated demands for them to shut up. They could tell he was trying (and failing) not to laugh at himself as well.

* * *

Hermione Granger had never experienced an indignation so strong as when she watched the bane of her existence rise a few feet in the air, before smoothly landing back on the lawn. She looked at her own broom with extreme distaste. Was there anything he _couldn’t_ do with infuriating ease? He barely took notes in class, barely cracked open a book before turning around and _teaching_ the material to others, barely put _any_ effort into his homework…

So intent on Sam Zhao was she that Hermione entirely missed Neville’s spectacular fall. It was with a degree of confusion that she watched him and the flying instructor leave the field not even halfway through the lesson. However, her keen ears heard Madam Hooch’s departing warning loud and clear: Stay on the ground or be expelled from Hogwarts!

Which was why, when Harry Potter decided to go after a gloating Malfoy on his broom, she shouted, “No! Madam Hooch told us not to move—you’ll get us all into trouble.”

For some inane reason, Harry ignored her. He shot into the sky without a backwards glance. Then Hermione heard a hoot of exhilaration behind her and whirled around to find Sam Zhao doing the same exact thing!

“What are you _doing?_ ” she shrieked up at him.

He suddenly swooped down towards her and she stumbled away with a yelp.

“I’m flying, of course!” he said, giving her a smile so brilliant that she almost smiled back. “I didn’t think—I mean, I knew—” He did a small twirl. “Amazing. I love it.”

Hermione felt she needed to at least _try_ to enforce order, even if the presence of Sam Zhao rendered it futile.

“If Madam Hooch sees you like that, you’ll be expelled!”

Sam laughed at her, as he often did. “Come on, Hermione. You don’t actually believe that, do you? At most, I’ll get a detention.”

“You don’t know that!”

“Of course I do!”

And then he was off again.

Moments later, somebody screamed and Hermione turned in time to see Harry Potter plummeting straight to the ground. More people screamed, herself included.

At the last second, Harry pulled his broom level and tumbled lightly onto the grass, the Remembrall clutched in his hand. The Gryffindors cheered.

“HARRY POTTER!”

And the cheering cut off with a whimper. Dread coursed through Hermione’s veins and she instinctively shrank back from the source of the shout.

An incensed Professor McGonagall stormed out onto the lawn, muttering half-sentences under her breath and looking like she might start breathing fire at the slightest provocation. She whisked Harry away back to the castle, leaving the rest of the Gryffindor and Slytherin first years outside without so much as a second glance.

“Ha! Would you look at that,” Malfoy crowed. “Potter’s gone and got himself expelled!”

The Slytherins laughed. Seamus and Dean had to physically restrain an apoplectic Ron Weasley from taking a swing at Malfoy’s head.

Hermione only sniffed. She’d _told_ Harry not to do it. Maybe now people would listen to her when she tried to keep them out of trouble.

“Wow, look at Sam!”

Or not.

Against her will, her eyes strayed towards the sky. She gasped as she spotted Sam flying in loops and twists, curving through the air with the grace of a bird in the wind.

No one was brave enough to join him, the fury of Professor McGonagall still fresh in their minds, but no one attempted to stop him either. The other students—Slytherin and Gryffindor alike—seemed content to ooh and aah from the ground, encouraging him into more and more dangerous stunts on his rickety old broom.

“Mister Zhao! _Mister Zhao!_ My word…get down here this instant, young man!”

Madam Hooch was back. Hermione suppressed a smile; _finally_ , Sam would get his comeuppance.

But instead of the expected scolding and/or expelling, Madam Hooch beamed—yes, _beamed_ —at the boy. “Impressive flying! I daresay you’ll make a formidable Chaser one day. Two points to Gryffindor!”

Speechless, Hermione could only stare at Sam in unmitigated shock.

He winked at her.

Hermione fumed.

* * *

“Neville?”

Neville woke with a fright, sitting up so abruptly from the cold, stone floor that he could feel the blood draining from his head.

“I, buh, wha…Sam?” He blearily peered up into Sam’s concerned face.

Sam looked him up and down. “How long have you been out here?”

“Oh, _hours_ ,” said Neville, gushing with relief. “I couldn’t remember the new password.”

“Right, right. It’s ‘pig snout,’ by the way. Let’s get you back inside.”

Sam stuck out his hand and Neville grasped it gratefully, hauling himself upright. He was glad he wouldn’t have to camp outside the portrait hole all night, or until Filch eventually found him and gave him detention for being out after curfew.

“Say, Sam? Why aren’t _you_ in bed?”

Sam opened his mouth to answer, but then the portrait swung outwards and knocked him off his feet.

“Sam!” cried Neville. He moved to try and help, only to be blocked by a trio of students stepping through the portrait hole.

“Blimey, Neville. What’re—”

“—care about yourselves, _I_ don’t want Slytherin—”

“Neville? Wait, is that Sam?”

“Oh, no! The Fat Lady is gone!”

“Oi, quiet! Are you trying to—”

Sam staggered to his feet. Even through the dark, they could all feel his glare and quickly fell silent. 

Neville had always thought Sam was a little scary, even when he seemed perfectly nice. He was just so _confident_. Always smiling, never faltering. Not even the Slytherins could find anything to be mean to him about. So seeing Sam like this, irritated and maybe a bit angry, was refreshing in a way because it made him seem more…human. 

“Why,” Sam began after he had dusted himself off, “are the three of you sneaking out in the middle of the night?”

Harry, Ron, and Hermione began talking all at once. There was a bunch of finger-pointing and raised voices and Neville stepped away from them, nervous about the racket they were making.

Sam waved his hand, cutting off the building argument. “Enough! Harry, Ron, _please_ don’t tell me you actually accepted that duel with Draco.”

Harry and Ron shuffled their feet.

“How do you know about that? You were missing at dinner,” Hermione said huffily.

“I only just remembered.” Sam let out a sigh, running a hand through his hair. “Okay, we’ll just wait out here until the Fat Lady gets back.”

“But we have to duel Malfoy in the trophy room at midnight!” Ron said.

“Oh, really?” scoffed Sam, sarcasm dripping like poison off his tongue. “Do you honestly think he’d risk getting caught? It’s more likely that he’s set you up and tipped off Mister Filch.”

Ron looked about to argue, but Sam shook his head, groaning in exasperation.

“Ron, I’m tired; I imagine Neville’s tired too. You’re in your _bathrobes_. If you really want to go, I won’t stop you, but don’t expect me to bail you out of an obvious trap.”

With that, Sam sat down. Neville immediately sat next to him and Hermione soon followed, sitting on Neville’s other side. After a few moments of hesitation, Harry and Ron joined them on the floor, looking slightly embarrassed.

They stayed that way in silence until, fifteen minutes later, the Fat Lady returned and let them into the common room with a disapproving tut.

Hermione swiftly retreated to the girls’ dormitories, sparing them only a curt goodnight. The boys took their time trudging up the stairs, fatigued by their earlier excitement.

They arrived at the door to their room and that’s when Neville noticed something very odd.

“Wait,” he said, glancing around. “Where’s Sam?”

Harry and Ron paused. They, too, glanced around, confused. Harry even went back down the stairs to check the common room.

“He’s not there,” Harry said. “But he did look tired before. Where’s he gone?”

Ron scratched his head. “Now that I think about it, does Sam even sleep in the dorm?”

“There’s five beds,” Neville realized. “Us three. Seamus, Dean.”

“Then that means—”

They stared at each other with wide eyes.

“Sam’s a _girl?_ ”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The original plan was to write exclusively from Harry's perspective for the entire story, but that quickly fell apart once I realized it would leave too much of the plot unexplained. I also did an experimental thing with Dumbledore's POV and if you didn't notice, that means it worked!
> 
> Thanks for reading!


	3. The Problem with Trolls

“I’m not a girl,” said Sam, rolling his eyes.

For most, this was just another ordinary breakfast at Hogwarts. For Harry, Ron, and Neville, however, it was about a week after their revelation about Sam’s sleeping whereabouts and they had finally worked up the courage to ask him about it.

“But then—”

“I’m not a boy either,” Sam interrupted while cutting his fried eggs into quarters. “Don’t have a gender.”

“But where do you sleep?” asked Harry.

Sam paused to regard him with the type of amusement he usually reserved for Hermione. “I have my own room in the tower.”

Harry, Ron, and Neville exchanged curious glances.

“Didn’t know there were private rooms. How’s that work?” asked Ron, leaning forward.

Sam gestured vaguely with his fork. “There’s a trick with the stairs. I’ll show you sometime. The room’s not spectacular or anything. There’s a bathroom and a nice window, but it’s all very small.”

Small and separate from everyone else. Harry thought about the cupboard under the stairs and suddenly felt very sorry for Sam.

“You could move into our room,” Harry offered. “There’s loads of space. No one’s going to mind.” He looked over to Ron and Neville, who readily voiced their agreement.

Sam chuckled. “That’s really sweet, you guys,” he said. Then he shrugged. “But I can’t.”

“Because you’re not a boy?” asked Neville.

“No, there’re other reasons. It’s complicated.”

They waited for Sam to elaborate, but he merely took a sip from his goblet.

“Well, all right,” said Harry. “But, er, if you change your mind…”

A soft smile crossed Sam’s lips. “I appreciate the sentiment.”

Harry felt his cheeks flush and he looked away, unsure of what else to say. It reminded him of when Mrs. Figg would thank him for helping to feed her cats. It wasn’t much trouble on his part, and it was _expected_ of him, but she insisted on thanking him all the same.

“So if you’re not a boy or a girl,” piped up Ron, “what do we call you, then?”

At this, Sam beamed, as though Ron had correctly answered a trick question about the properties of fluxweed. “I’m glad you asked! I’m not particular about pronouns, but let’s keep it simple and stick with ‘he’ and ‘him.’ Make sense?”

They all nodded in a confused sort of way. Harry still didn’t quite understand how someone could be neither a boy nor a girl, but if anyone could pull it off, it would definitely be Sam.

Honestly, Harry hadn’t expected their questioning to be met with such a pleasant attitude. One of the reasons they had waited so long to bring up the topic with Sam was because they hadn’t been able to figure out if asking about one’s sleeping whereabouts was rude. It had been Neville, of the three of them, who had decided to just get it over with as soon as possible.

“Great!” said Sam, radiating approval. “You know, I’m surprised it took you guys so long to notice. It’s been more than a month.”

“I thought you just woke up really early,” Ron defended petulantly.

“Me? Wake up _early?_ Good one, Ron. Pass the bacon, please.”

Sam would never get his bacon, for at that moment, the morning mail arrived. Six large owls dropped a long, thin package in front of Harry. Its impact with the table knocked the bacon plate to the floor. Another owl gave Harry an envelope and he opened it to reveal a note from Professor McGonagall telling him to unwrap the parcel in private as it contained his brand new Nimbus Two Thousand.

“How mysterious,” grumbled Sam, eyeing Harry’s gift with a flat expression. “I wonder what that broom-shaped, broom-looking, broom-like object could possibly be. The suspense is killing me.”

Harry ignored him. He figured Sam was just bitter about the bacon.

That evening, he was able to put his new broom to good use when Oliver Wood, the Gryffindor captain, introduced him to the wonders of Quidditch. According to Wood, the game was simple: Chasers scored with the Quaffle, Beaters whacked the Bludgers with bats, the Keeper guarded the hoops, and the Seeker—Harry’s position—needed only to catch the Golden Snitch. 

As it turned out, Harry was a very good Seeker. So good, in fact, that by the end of the training session, Wood was practically jumping up and down in joy. Harry thought it rather silly that he could inspire such happiness in another person by simply catching golf balls, but one look at the ecstatic fifth year quelled any doubts that he had accomplished a great feat. He resolved to do his best to make Wood proud.

Ron and Neville were both mightily impressed by Harry making the team at such a young age. They took every opportunity to accompany him down to the Quidditch pitch to watch him train and he would always let Ron borrow his Nimbus after team practice (Neville had yet to recover from the trauma of his disastrous first flying lesson and so stayed far away from any brooms).

Sam, on the other hand, did not share their admiration.

“You were lucky,” he explained off-handedly to Harry one night in the common room, “that you’re a natural at flying. And that McGonagall was the one who saw you. I mean, she’s playing clear favorites here. You did something dangerous and instead of punishing you, she buys you the most expensive broom on the market. I’ve never seen anyone so flagrantly abuse their authority! What a disappointment.”

Sam’s words managed to pierce straight through Harry’s good cheer. It was one thing to hear Hermione’s obnoxious voice nagging at him about rules and points and expulsion, but to hear it from Sam just…hurt.

“Yeah, well—” Harry scrambled for something to say and in the process, a hot anger flared to life beneath his skin. “What else was I supposed to do? Just let Malfoy fly off with Neville’s Remembrall? Nobody else was doing anything! Not even _you_.”

It was then that Sam turned fully to look at him, an expression of mild surprise on his face. “I’m not talking about you, Harry. Fff—screw Malfoy, honestly. It’s great that you stood up to him. My grievances are with _McGonagall_.” 

“But…” began Harry. He tried to piece his thoughts into sentences, but only ended up pressing his lips together and shaking his head. “Never mind.” 

An uneasy silence stretched between them. Searching for a distraction, Harry opened his Charms textbook and stared at the page. After a while, he heard a sigh.

“Can I guess what you were going to say?” asked Sam.

Harry shrugged, unwilling to look him in the eye.

Sam sat up straighter and crossed his legs. “How’s this: if McGonagall hadn’t done what she did, you wouldn’t be on the Quidditch team and you wouldn’t have a Nimbus Two Thousand. Me criticizing her sounds like I’m saying you don’t deserve either of those things. Am I close?”

Harry scrunched up his nose. “It’s not just that,” he found himself saying. The words came easier now that Sam had cleared the air. “It’s ‘cause I did the right thing. I _know_ I did, except no one usually listens to my side of the story. So it was nice to be the _hero_ for once. I saved the Remembrall and I showed up Malfoy and everyone’s happy that I’m the new Seeker.”

He lifted his head, feeling an unfamiliar sense of pride. Everything seemed so much more real now that he’d said it aloud. He _had_ done those things and people liked him for it!

“I _want_ to play Quidditch,” he rambled on, excitement building in his chest. “It’s fun and I’m good at it. McGonagall said my father played too! I had no idea. It’s like I’m…closer to him now.”

“He’d be proud of you,” said Sam, as though he knew for sure. And he probably did; he was a genius after all.

A lump formed in Harry’s throat as he tried to swallow down a sudden rush of emotion. He rubbed the back of his neck, blinking back the stinging in his eyes. “Er, thanks, Sam. I don’t really know why I got angry before.”

“I do.” He glanced up to find his friend smiling at him with gentle eyes. “This is the best thing that’s ever happened to you, isn’t it?”

Somehow, he knew Sam wasn’t just talking about the broom and the Quidditch team. 

“Yeah. It’s the best thing ever.”

Sam grinned, then reached out and ruffled Harry’s hair. Indignant, Harry swatted the hand away, glaring up at his tormentor.

“Sam!”

Sam laughed. “Sorry, sorry! I couldn’t help it, now, could I? You’re adorable.”

“I am not adorable!”

Sam laughed harder.

Harry had no choice but to shove him off the couch.

* * *

“I don’t know how you do it. A school full of children. _Magical_ children. They outnumber us, you know. We’re not safe. We never will be. They could kill us all in our sleep.”

“Good evening to you, too, Sam. Sherbet lemon?”

“I’ll pass. Anyway, I’ve been thinking…I need a better way to get to your office.”

“Oh? What brought this on?”

“Well, for one, Hermione caught me sneaking out tonight. Scary girl. You don’t know true terror until you’ve been accosted by a shrubbery.”

* * *

“ _Wingardium Leviosa!_ ”

Ron glowered at his feather when nothing happened. He glanced around the Charms classroom and his eyes alighted on Sam, who was currently demonstrating the swish and flick to Lavender and Dean. He tried to send a distress signal across the room to his friend (mainly by narrowing his eyes and staring really, _really_ hard), but Sam was too engrossed in helping his other classmates to notice.

Giving up on that, Ron next sought out Professor Flitwick, only to realize the professor already had his hands full with Neville’s hiccuping nose hairs. Well, that was fine; Ron didn’t want the professor’s help anyway. He still felt a bit resentful towards Flitwick for pairing him with—

“You’re saying it wrong,” snapped Hermione Granger, the bossiest, nosiest, most dreadful girl in their year. “It’s Wing-GAR-dium Levi-O-sa, make the ‘gar’ nice and long.”

“You do it, then, if you’re so clever,” Ron snarled.

Hermione proceeded to perform the spell perfectly, garnering a delighted congratulations from the professor.

Ron grit his teeth.

On the other side of the room, Lavender let out an ecstatic squeal as her feather began to rise to the ceiling. Sam was clapping for her, smiling broadly, his wand tucked behind his ear. He didn’t participate as much in class anymore because he was just too good at magic and wanted to give the others a chance to shine in front of the professors (except for Potions, where he still took every opportunity to stick it to Snape each Friday with his perfect brewing).

It was all very noble of Sam, but that meant a certain know-it-all was now their top points-earner. And instead of being grateful, she’d become more insufferable than ever.

“It’s no wonder no one can stand her,” Ron told Harry after class.

“Ron, _no_ ,” came Sam’s voice from behind, low with warning.

But Ron ignored him and continued, “She’s a nightmare, honestly.”

Then Hermione was rushing past him with tears in her eyes and Ron felt a bit awful.

Then Sam was in front of him—not even cross, just disappointed—and Ron felt even more awful.

He and Sam, along with Harry, had stopped in the middle of a hallway, to the annoyance of the other students making their way to class. Some part of Ron worried that they’d be late to their own class if they didn’t hurry along, but Sam clearly had other ideas.

Harry shifted between the two of them, an uncertain expression on his face.

“Ron,” said Sam with an air of frustration, “there are things you just shouldn’t say out loud. That was one of them.”

“But it’s true!” Ron protested. He thought about all the times he had been hounded by Hermione for stupid, little things and crossed his arms in defiance. “If she wants friends, she should act like it. With the way she is, I reckon she _prefers_ to be alone.”

Sam heaved a sigh and Ron winced, bracing himself for the incoming lecture. Really, he should have known better by now than to argue with Sam about anything because Sam always found a way to win, usually by being blunt and reasonable and knowing complicated words.

“Ron, I know Hermione’s not the best at making friends, but that doesn’t mean she’s not trying. No one wants to be alone, not truly. I think you really hurt her.”

Ron thought so too, even if he wasn’t going to admit it. He looked to Harry for support, but his other friend just held up his hands and leaned away from the conversation.

“Well, she should’ve thought of that before showing off in class!” Ron blurted. “She’s always rubbing it in our faces or sticking her nose in other people’s business…or trying to get you expelled!”

It was Sam’s turn to wince. Ever since their first flying lesson, Hermione had developed some kind of obsession with Sam and had recently somehow come up with the absurd notion that he was regularly breaking curfew to skulk around Hogwarts in the middle of the night. She had reported this to several teachers, who had taken her seriously and even gotten the headmaster involved. 

Nothing came of it in the end (obviously), but now there were all sorts of rumors about Sam, most of which were damaging to his previously spotless reputation. Worst of all was Ron’s older brother, Perfect Prefect Percy, who now disapproved of his friendship with Sam and took every opportunity to warn Ron away from him. It was completely ridiculous.

Hermione Granger was a menace, Ron had decided. He couldn’t understand why Sam insisted on being nice to her and he wasn’t going to apologize for speaking his mind.

He told this to Sam, who stared at him for a while.

“Fair enough,” said Sam eventually, and it was such a surprise that Ron’s mouth fell open in shock. “I don’t entirely agree with you, but I can see now isn’t the time for this. You should get to class.”

Ron shared a puzzled glance with Harry.

“You aren’t coming?” Harry asked.

“I’m going to find Hermione. This is mostly my fault. I need to make things right.”

“How is it _your_ fault?”

“I should’ve been paying attention.” Sam shook his head. “Well, doesn’t matter now. I’ll talk to her and maybe then we can all be friends. We need a girl in our group, don’t you think?”

“No,” said Harry.

“Not at all,” said Ron.

“Boys,” Sam muttered, rolling his eyes.

(Ron still got a thrill whenever he was reminded of Sam’s secret—that he was neither a boy nor a girl, but someone “disinterested in the gender dichotomy,” as Sam had put it. It was so _cool_ and so _Sam_ and probably very American. Ron sometimes wished he was “agender” as well. Then he’d have his own room in Gryffindor Tower, something no one in his family had ever accomplished before.)

After wishing Sam dubious good luck, Ron and Harry rushed to their next class. They barely made it through the door in time, eliciting a sharp glance from Professor McGonagall.

“And where is Mister Zhao?” she asked with one eyebrow raised.

“Stomach ache,” said Ron.

Harry nodded enthusiastically.

“And Miss Granger?”

“Er…stomach ache?”

Harry nodded less enthusiastically. 

The professor didn’t look very convinced, but she let the matter go. Class went on.

They didn’t see Sam again until halfway through lunch.

“I’ve been an idiot,” he announced, to the confusion of the nearby lunch-goers.

Rather than sitting down to eat, he began gathering various foods from the table. A wicker basket appeared out of thin air and Sam placed his dishes into it, politely thanking the floor.

Ron could only hold his tongue a few seconds before asking, “What are you doing?”

“Peace offerings for the Lady Granger,” Sam explained, lifting a bowl of strawberries.

Ron’s eyes widened. “You’re mad!”

“Maybe. Like I said, I’ve been a bit stupid—turns out I’m not half as charming as I think I am—so I’ve scaled back my goals. At the moment, I’m aiming for mutual respect.”

“Mutual respect,” Ron echoed, wondering what the bloody hell that meant.

Sam didn’t deign to explain any further and soon exited the hall with his basket of treats, leaving behind a few bewildered Gryffindors.

“Huh,” said Dean, still staring after their weirdest friend. “I have a feeling there’s a story behind that.”

Ron shrugged helplessly. “Just Sam being Sam.”

The rest of the afternoon passed by slowly, anticipation for the Halloween feast building with each agonizing minute. Both Sam and Hermione had not shown up for their afternoon classes, which had been strange enough to warrant questions from the professors (“Even so, this is so unlike them!” Professor Sprout had exclaimed upon hearing Ron’s trusty stomach ache excuse).

Come dinnertime, still no one had seen hide nor hair of the two, until Anthony Goldstein of Ravenclaw approached Ron and Harry outside the Great Hall.

“You’ll want to watch out for your mate Zhao,” he said in a conspiratorial whisper. “I saw him and Granger in the library. They were… _doing_ things together.”

Ron and Harry just looked at him, confused.

Seeing their befuddlement, Goldstein shook his head in disbelief. “They were studying! Together! You _know_ what that means.”

“What does that mean?” asked Ron.

“Merlin’s beard! You’re hopeless!” Goldstein said, shaking his head again. “Don’t say I didn’t warn you.”

The Ravenclaw turned and strode away, continuing to shake his head.

“I don’t understand,” said Harry.

“Me neither. Mind, Fred and George once told me all Ravenclaws are a tad touched in the head, so there’s that.”

“I’m glad I’m not in Ravenclaw.”

“You’re not the only one.”

They put the encounter out of their minds as they entered the Great Hall. 

Ron had grown up hearing stories about Hogwarts through his parents and brothers, but none of them had been able to convey the sheer brilliance of living inside the castle. Now, as he took his seat at the Gryffindor table, bats flitting around his ears and pumpkins grinning at him from all directions, he quite understood how impossible it was to capture this experience with mere words.

Breathing in the aroma of Halloween at Hogwarts, Ron pushed all thoughts of bushy-haired menaces and barmy Ravenclaws from his head. He was not going to let anything stop him from enjoying this feast.

Professor Quirrell chose this moment to burst into the hall.

“Troll—in the dungeons—thought you ought to know.”

Then Quirrell fainted.

Ron buried his head in his hands and let out a tortured groan.

* * *

The Great Hall erupted into shouts of fright.

“Settle down, settle down!” came the reassuring call of Professor Dumbledore. The tip of his wand was pressed to his throat, amplifying his voice.

Everyone quieted, though Harry noticed quite a few students quivering in their seats. Up at the staff table, most of the professors were standing, wands in hand, looking to Dumbledore for guidance.

“Gryffindor and Ravenclaw prefects, please lead your Houses back to your dormitories,” said the Headmaster. “Hufflepuff and Slytherin shall remain here until we’ve ensured the danger has passed.”

He gave a nod, then turned to speak with the other professors.

On cue, Percy immediately sprung to his feet, issuing instructions in that self-important tone of his. Harry soon found himself shuffling along the corridors with the rest of his House. The going was slow, as everyone kept glancing around for any glimpse of the troll, and it seemed they had entirely lost that frantic, initial sense of urgency.

A realization hit Harry like a train halfway up to Gryffindor Tower. His feet refused to move and a few disgruntled Housemates bumped past him with various noises of disapproval. Ron, who’d been a few paces behind, stopped to look at Harry in confusion.

“It’s Sam!” Harry told him in a coarse whisper. “And Hermione. They don’t know about the troll!”

Ron’s mouth opened in horror. “We have to tell Percy!”

Together, they craned their necks to search the throng of Gryffindors for Percy’s tall, distinctive figure. Ron eventually spotted him at the very lead of the group, far ahead of them.

“There’s no time,” Harry decided grimly. “We have to go get them now.”

Ron’s expression betrayed just how brave he truly felt, but he nonetheless followed Harry away from the crowd.

“It’s fine,” said Harry, mostly to himself. “The troll is in the dungeons. Sam and Hermione are in the library. We’ll just get them and run back before anyone notices.”

They scuttled back down the stairs as quickly and as quietly as they could. The hallways were eerily still, devoid of bustling students and friendly ghosts. Even the portraits were empty, their tenants out helping the professors locate the troll.

It seemed like ages before they arrived at the library. Harry and Ron burst through the doors and were met with the piercing glare of Madam Pince.

“Shh!” she shushed.

“There’s a troll! We’ve got to get our friends!” said Ron.

“Lower your voice!” snapped Madam Pince. “There’s no troll here. If you’d ever picked up a book, you’d know they can’t read.”

“But our friends—”

“A boy and a girl, yes. You’ve just missed them. Now, shoo!”

Unwilling to test the librarian’s patience any further, Harry and Ron beat a hasty retreat.

“That doesn’t make sense. We should have run into them on the way down,” Harry said.

Ron shrugged. “They must’ve gone to the Great Hall. That’s good. Most of the professors stayed behind, didn’t they? Dumbledore too.”

Harry should have felt relieved. Instead, his sense of unease grew stronger.

“We should check,” he said. “Just in case.”

“We’ll definitely get in trouble then!” exclaimed Ron.

“Does it matter? If there’s a troll…”

Ron glanced away, looking a bit queasy. “Right. Yeah. Let’s go find them.”

They headed in the direction of the Great Hall in silence. Harry found that he was a bit angry at Ron for being more concerned about getting in trouble than about Sam’s wellbeing. Weren’t they friends? What if Harry were the one missing?

As they hurried down another corridor, these thoughts were banished from his mind by a horrid stench that worsened as they reached the bend. Harry slowed and held his sleeve to his nose. He turned to Ron, who was doing the same.

“What _is_ that—” Harry began, only to be cut off when a mane of bushy hair suddenly attacked his face.

He heard a shriek from the owner of the hair (Hermione, he realized quickly) and a wordless shout from Ron, then someone was tugging his arm back in the direction he’d come from.

“Run!” shouted a voice that probably belonged to Sam.

“Troll!” said Ron.

“ _Run!_ ” shouted Sam again.

Harry didn’t need to be told thrice. He grabbed Hermione’s robes, yanking her with him as his legs spurred into motion. Ron was right next to him, eyes wide and frantic, and Sam ran in the lead, his wand clasped in his hand.

The sound of booming footsteps and animalistic grunting chased them down the corridor, getting louder with each passing second. Harry chanced a look over his shoulder and saw the troll, a great boulder of a creature, lumbering after them with a gigantic club. It was ugly and smelly and still gaining on them despite its unwieldy size.

“Get ready!” Sam yelled without a trace of fatigue as they raced towards the archway leading to the Grand Staircase. “We’ll run up the stairs and I’ll destroy them behind us!”

“Destroy them?” screeched Hermione.

“ _Bombarda Maxima_ is a wonderful spell!”

The confident lilt of Sam’s voice instantly put Harry’s worries to rest. Somehow, being chased by a troll in a magical boarding school wasn’t so scary when Sam was leading the way. They had a plan; everything was going to be all right.

Then a second troll appeared. 

This one was even larger than the first. It shuffled into view in front of the stairs and they all skidded to a stop, making various sounds of surprise and fear. The troll turned at the commotion, looking down at them and blinking like it was confused. It then seemed to come to a decision.

It lifted its club.

Harry instinctively pivoted on his heel to run the other direction, only to freeze midstep as he saw that the first troll had caught up to them and was now blocking the way. They were trapped. Heart pounding in his ears, he glanced over his shoulder, just in time to see the second troll begin to swing its club downwards. He squeezed his eyes shut.

“ _Depulso!_ ”

A tremendous force sent Harry hurtling back in the direction of the first troll. He opened his eyes and screamed, thinking he’d been hit by the club, but the pain didn’t come. Instead, he once again found Hermione’s hair in his face as they flew past the first troll through the gap between its legs, continuing all the way back down the hallway. This came to an abrupt end as they collided with the wall, landing in a heap of tangled limbs.

Dazed and somewhat amazed his glasses had survived the ordeal, Harry slowly stumbled to his feet. He caught sight of red hair and breathed a sigh of relief. Ron was safe too. They needed to keep moving, though, or the trolls would get them again. If they could just get close enough to the Great Hall, surely someone would hear them and alert Dumbledore.

He turned to Ron and Hermione, who were also on their feet now—and his blood ran cold.

For the second time that evening, Harry realized one of his friends was missing.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Madam Pince is my favorite side character in all of the books. She might actually drink the tears of children and I think that's beautiful.
> 
> Thanks for reading!


	4. Thick as a Brick

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Obligatory warning for mentions of blood and very mild gore.

Severus Snape cursed under his breath as he struggled to keep pace with Professor Flitwick. Many would think that a man of Flitwick’s stature would be the one having trouble in matters of speed, but it seemed the Charms professor took a personal delight in defying such presumptions. Severus’s only consolation was that McGonagall seemed even more vexed by her colleague’s spryness than he was.

“Enough!” McGonagall had stopped, taking shallow breaths as she leaned a hand against a wall. “It’s clear Quirinus was quite mistaken about the dungeons—perhaps even about the troll itself!”

They had initially ventured into the dungeons with caution, hoping to catch the troll off guard and take it down with minimal fuss. After sweeping the corridors once, they’d doubled back at a more spirited pace in case they’d missed something. They hadn’t, and if it somehow turned out they had, Severus would eat a cauldron.

Flitwick tutted. “Now, now, Minerva. I know he’s been rather…jittery since his sabbatical, but Quirinus has one of the brightest minds I’ve ever had the pleasure of teaching.”

“I am sincerely beginning to doubt that, considering recent events,” said McGonagall crossly.

“Minerva is right,” Severus cut in. He made no effort to hide the sneer in his voice. “The troll isn’t here or we would have smelled it a mile away. We should report this to the headmaster, then have Madam Pomfrey check the inside of Quirrell’s skull for cobwebs.”

The corner of McGonagall’s mouth twitched. Severus pretended not to notice, but inwardly smiled at the accomplishment.

“Very well,” said Flitwick with a sigh, although Severus suspected he was not as reluctant as he appeared to be. “Shall we—”

There was a muffled, yet audible thud from the ceiling. Then another. And another, faster this time.

“It’s running,” breathed Flitwick in muted horror.

Severus shared startled glances with the two other professors, before all three of them sprinted for the nearest stairs.

“An actual troll! Running around in Hogwarts!” McGonagall muttered to herself, as though infuriated by the very concept.

“It’s too far from the Great Hall to be Albus!” cried Flitwick. “It must be chasing something!”

“Weasley twins,” Severus grumbled. Still, he doubled his pace.

When they reached the Grand Staircase, a distinctive odor made itself known, confirming the presence of the troll. Severus looked up as he climbed and saw its hideous behind blocking one of the corridor archways.

And then he heard the scream.

Shrill. Horrified. It might have been a girl, but young children tended to sound alike in terror.

Flitwick needed no further encouragement, casting a spell that propelled himself the rest of the way up the stairs. A Screeching Hex grabbed the mountain troll’s attention and it turned around with a befuddled expression. McGonagall then took the opportunity to conjure thick ropes that lashed the creature’s feet together, leaving Severus to blast the club out of its hand.

With a sharp tug of her wand, McGonagall pulled the troll’s feet out from under its bulky body. It crashed onto its back with a loud groan.

To the professors’ great surprise, there was another troll behind it.

“ _Two_ trolls in Hogwarts!” said McGonagall, scandalized, even as she conjured several more ropes to fling at the two beasts.

The troll that had fallen easily succumbed to the ropes and was soon trussed up like a ham. Its companion, however, managed to fend them off with clumsy yet effective swipes of its club. It roared, fully aggravated now, and stomped towards them with feral ferocity.

Severus raised his wand, ready to obscure the troll’s vision, when a splash of red caught his eye. The spell he’d been about to cast fizzled from his mind.

Blood. He knew it was blood. How could he not? He just couldn’t quite comprehend why there was so much of it here, in this corridor, at this moment.

“Snape!”

He jerked at the sound of McGonagall’s voice and hurriedly cast the spell he had meant to cast before. A thick cloud of stinging, purple smoke billowed from the tip of his wand, gathering around the troll’s head. This stopped the troll in its tracks, as it promptly dropped its club to rub its eyes.

The three professors made quick work of it from there. Both trolls were bound, unconscious, and piled neatly at the end of the corridor in minutes. With their enormous strength and tough skin, the beasts might even have been difficult opponents if it weren’t for their incredible stupidity. 

The danger now gone, Severus focused his full attention on the blood. He wasn’t the only one to have noticed, as Flitwick was already kneeling by its source and McGonagall had sucked in an audible, tremulous breath. As Severus approached, he easily identified the victim as one of his students.

Sam Zhao was dead. His robes did nothing to obscure the brokenness of his body nor could they stop the growing pool of red liquid slowly creeping past his feet. His half open eyes still held a hint of a sparkle, until Flitwick gently closed them, sighing.

With a muted sense of approval, Severus noted the wand clutched in the boy’s hand. It seemed Zhao, despite his disruptive tendencies in class, had been a true wizard to the very end.

“Sam! _Sam!_ ”

Severus did not turn at the sound of shoes clattering against the stone floor, but he could recognize the Granger girl’s shrill voice anywhere.

“Miss Granger!” said McGonagall, panic coloring her tone. “Potter, Weasley, stay back!”

Flitwick conjured a stretcher and lifted Zhao onto it.

“What about Sam?” demanded Potter. “Is he all right?”

Severus conjured a white sheet and draped it over the body.

“No, Mister Potter.” McGonagall’s voice trembled. “No, he’s not.”

At this, Granger began to sob. Her great, piteous wails drowned out Potter’s incomprehensible stammering and Severus listened, his back to the children, as McGonagall ushered them away to her office.

“Severus, could you send for the headmaster?” Flitwick asked with a slight shake of his head. “I’m afraid I can’t manage a Patronus at the moment.”

A younger Severus would have been simultaneously flattered and offended at the insinuation. The current Severus simply called upon a happy memory and fired off a silvery strand of light from his wand.

There hadn’t been a death at Hogwarts in fifty years. That a child had died on his watch rattled Severus more than he thought it would. Moreover, this wasn’t some unexplainable Chamber of Secrets mystery, but rather the work of two dumb beasts that had somehow found their way into Hogwarts. If Quirrell hadn’t raised the alarm—

Quirrell. Trolls. A memory tickled at the back of his mind.

Before he could think more on the matter, the headmaster arrived with a thunderous crack. Dumbledore’s bright blue eyes immediately fell upon Zhao’s lifeless form laid out on the stretcher, covered by the sheet. His expression was unreadable.

“The troll was not in the dungeons,” Severus said in lieu of a greeting.

Dumbledore did not reply, merely glancing to the side where they had stacked the two unconscious trolls.

Flitwick gave Severus a disapproving look before clearing his throat. “There were four students involved: Potter, Granger, Ronald Weasley, and…Zhao. The other three are with Minerva.”

“I see,” said Dumbledore. He did not move.

Flitwick cleared his throat again. “Shall I go contact St. Mungo’s and the Ministry?” he asked expectantly.

“No.”

One of Severus’s eyebrows shot up in surprise.

“No?” squeaked Flitwick.

Dumbledore turned to them. “If there are two trolls in Hogwarts, then there could very well be more. And if four students were wandering the halls without supervision, then I can almost guarantee there are others. Before we do anything else, we must ensure the children are safe.

“Filius, return to the Great Hall and escort the Slytherin and Hufflepuff Houses to their common rooms through the secret passages. Make sure they are all accounted for and that they _stay_ there. Only then should you contact the Ministry.” He paused to consider. “Take Quirinus with you. Have the rest of the professors search the school for any other threats.”

“Why Quirinus?” Flitwick asked with a touch of incredulity.

Dumbledore smiled with a distinct lack of amusement. “It wouldn’t do to have our Defence Against the Dark Arts professor faint twice in one day, now, would it?”

Flitwick seemed taken aback, but nodded nevertheless. His instructions received, the Charms professor scampered off down the corridor, leaving Severus alone with the headmaster and the corpse that had once been his student.

“There is something suspicious about Quirrell,” Severus remarked once Flitwick was well out of earshot. He carefully gauged the headmaster’s reaction, but Dumbledore gave nothing away. It was almost as though he hadn’t even heard Severus in the first place. 

Instead, Dumbledore sighed. He suddenly looked impossibly old, his shoulders sagging as he directed his attention to the mess in the corridor. With a twist of his wand, the blood vanished from the floor and wall. A complicated twirl, and silver chains sprang into existence, wrapping themselves tightly around the trolls and hoisting them into the air. A swish and a flick levitated the occupied stretcher to Dumbledore’s side.

“If you’ll accompany me, Severus? Let us make our way to the Hospital Wing.”

Severus would have preferred to go looking for more trolls, but he followed the headmaster in silence.

When they arrived, Madam Pomfrey stood so abruptly from her desk that she knocked her dinner to the floor. As the situation was explained, her mouth twisted and her eyes watered and by the end she had snatched Zhao’s limp body from the stretcher to gently lay him on a bed. She set about waving her wand through the air in intricate patterns, singing spells from all the Healing manuals, as though by some miracle she could bring the boy back through sheer willpower alone.

And when her wand dropped from her limp fingers, Severus assumed she had finally realized the futility of her efforts.

But then the matron turned to Dumbledore with wide eyes, her trembling hands raised to her mouth, and Severus knew something was wrong.

“He’s not alive,” Pomfrey whispered. “He’s never _been_ alive.”

For a moment, Severus forgot how to breathe, so confused was he. From the corner of his eye, he noticed Dumbledore stiffen, his somber air replaced by a sudden intensity.

“What does that even mean? Check again!” Severus snapped at Pomfrey, even as he began to scour the depths of his knowledge for some form of magic that would make her words true.

There were Boggarts, shapeshifters that were neither alive nor dead, but their forms were fluid (and besides, no Boggart could have remained in the company of giggly schoolchildren for so long). Certainly, there were _things_ one could do to create a…humanoid figure. But none, not even the most heinous of these methods, could produce something as complete as an actual person, which Zhao seemed to be.

Assuming Pomfrey hadn’t completely botched her spells, that only left more questions. Who or what was Zhao? Why was he, a supposed American, enrolled at Hogwarts and, what’s more, attending the same year as the Boy Who Lived? Were the trolls a coincidence or part of a larger plot? Did it have something to do with the headmaster’s decision to keep half the students in the Great Hall? Could the Dark Lord…?

A contemplative hum cut through the tense atmosphere of the infirmary. Severus looked sharply to the headmaster, whose calculating gaze suggested he had arrived at some sort of conclusion.

However, instead of enlightening them on his speculations, Dumbledore burst into a radiant smile. “Why, this is simply wonderful!” the old man exclaimed, clapping his hands together excitedly.

Severus did not bother to hide his shock. Neither did Pomfrey.

“Headmaster,” said the matron faintly. “I’m not sure I understand.”

“It’s rather simple, my dear. If someone has never been alive, then it must follow that they also cannot be dead.”

Pomfrey adopted a rather constipated expression. “Well, I suppose…”

“And if young Sam here is not dead, then I believe a full recovery to be entirely within the realm of possibility. Do you agree?”

“Er,” said Pomfrey.

“Splendid!” Dumbledore turned to Severus with a genial smile. “I would appreciate it if you would inform Minerva and three very distraught children of the good news.”

It took Severus a moment to realize the headmaster was sending him away. “Headmaster, if I could study the boy—”

“Thank you, Severus, but between Poppy and myself, I am sure we’ll be able to puzzle things out. I have, after all, accumulated quite a bit of knowledge in all my years on this earth.”

The dismissal stung, even more so for how gently it was worded. Severus was no stranger to secrets, but to be excluded from information pertaining to the safety of the students? It was downright irresponsible, let alone nonsensical, and he couldn’t think of anything he’d done to lose the headmaster’s trust. No, there had to be another factor at play, something glaringly obvious that he’d somehow missed. If only the headmaster would _talk to him_ —

But Dumbledore had already swanned over to Pomfrey’s potions cabinet, perusing the selection of bottles and phials while whistling a merry tune. Pomfrey herself was just now gathering her wits, retrieving her wand from the ground and fussing about the boy…or whatever Zhao was.

Knowing he wouldn’t get what he wanted, especially not by standing there and gawking, Severus turned and strode out of the infirmary with a scowl that came more naturally than breathing.

 _Let Dumbledore keep his bloody secrets_ , he thought as he swept down another corridor. _See where it gets him_.

It wasn’t long before Severus arrived at the door to McGonagall’s office. He hesitated briefly before knocking twice on the solid wood.

“Come in.”

The door swung open to reveal McGonagall at her desk and three sniffling Gryffindors sitting across from her, clinging to half-empty cups of tea. Severus avoided meeting any of their gazes.

“Professor Snape,” greeted McGonagall with a professional nod. Her weary eyes regarded him carefully. “How can I help you?”

Severus wasn’t in the mood for being helped, but still managed to relay his intended message. “It seems Mister Zhao will make a full recovery. Madam Pomfrey and the headmaster are currently…tending to his wounds.”

Granger let out a little gasp.

“Full recovery?” echoed Potter in a small voice.

Severus made the mistake of looking into the brat’s eyes ( _Lily’s eyes_ —he cursed himself for even thinking it) and found them wide with something like hope. To see that expression on James Potter’s face, directed towards _him_ …

It felt like poison.

“It means he’s not dead,” Severus snapped, both more and less viciously than he’d intended.

His words seemed to hang in the air. There was visible disbelief from McGonagall, who had seen for herself Zhao’s dead body and who would be asking many questions in the near future.

But the children. He could pinpoint the exact moment it dawned for each of them, that they would not need to become mourners so early in their lives.

The Weasley boy broke the silence first, bursting into tears of relief, his shoulders shuddering with the force of his emotions. Granger instantly moved to comfort him, a watery ghost of a smile on her lips as she hugged his arm. And Potter…

Potter hid his face, his arm over his eyes, his glasses hanging from one ear. Unlike the other two, he held completely still, but his wet, jagged breathing gave him away. He was crying.

It was something Severus had never seen before. Not once in seven years.

He left without another word.

* * *

Poppy Pomfrey had seen many things in her time as the matron of Hogwarts. Children always managed to find the most creative ways to get themselves into trouble and it was left to her to sort out the aftermath. She didn’t much mind; this was her job, after all, and she rather liked staring down the students and giving them a piece of her mind. The way the children were instantly cowed by her admonishments proved far more satisfying than yelling at the selectively deaf dimwits she’d been obligated to treat during her previous stint at St. Mungo’s.

“Not quite, not quite. Redundant at best. Ah, and dreadfully uninspired. A shame.”

This, however, was so unbelievably outside her area of expertise that she wondered if she might ought to return to St. Mungo’s right now to spare herself the headache.

Dumbledore shook his head at the book in his hands, flipping through its pages in a way that would have made Irma Pince weep fat, ugly tears. He stopped about halfway through the thick tome, narrowed his eyes, muttered to himself some more, then continued flipping.

Without even reading it herself, Poppy knew the book was another dead end. Her lips pursed, barely containing a weary sigh. Not for the first time, she wandered over to the child lying peacefully on a nearby cot. No changes, not that she’d expected any, but she took the time to reassure herself of the rise and fall of his chest and the steady pulse in his wrist.

She’d actually scoffed at the headmaster—scoffed right in his face—when he’d told her to heal the child’s injuries as usual. Never before had she treated someone in as bad a condition as Sam Zhao, simply by the virtue that wizards tended to die from such wounds long before ending up in her care.

“Rather convenient, then, that this particular patient cannot die,” Dumbledore had said to her in that infuriating, knowing tone of his.

That had left Poppy with the arduous task of piecing back together a dead, brutalized body. Potions to regrow organs and repair tissues, spells to knit little white shards back into bones. In all her years of Healing, it was the most magic she had ever performed in one sitting. (Truly, she deserved a pay raise…or a flagon of Firewhiskey. She wasn’t picky.)

Poppy trusted Albus Dumbledore. She really did. And yet, it had still come as a great shock when—after making liberal use of a dozen different highly potent tinctures—the child’s heart had suddenly begun to beat.

She’d have called it a miracle if miracles weren’t already a sickle a dozen in the Wizarding World. Why, just ten years ago that Potter boy had survived a Killing Curse straight to the noggin. She didn’t know why she even bothered being surprised anymore. Habit, she supposed.

So Sam Zhao wasn’t dead. He wasn’t alive either, but Poppy decided not to dwell on semantics. She’d done her job and done it well. Another student was hale and hearty again thanks to her hard work.

But that was somewhat of a lie, considering the patient in question refused to wake up.

The sharp clap of a closing book startled Poppy’s attention back to the headmaster. His expression flickered with amusement (at her expense, the cheeky bugger) as he tossed the book to the side and picked up another.

Dumbledore’s cavalier treatment of library texts was the only sign of his waning patience. How many had he gone through already? Ten? Twelve? Had it not been well past three in the morning, Poppy might have spared the energy to count the growing stack of discarded titles on the bedside table. As it was, her eyesight had gone all blurry and her eyelids threatened to stay closed with every blink. Dumbledore had suggested, just once, that she take some rest, but she had glowered at him so fiercely that she was sure she had ruptured a few blood vessels.

“Progress?” she finally asked, just to have something to say.

“Not quite,” Dumbledore answered without looking up from his reading. He stroked his beard with a thoughtful hum. “I admit to being at somewhat of a loss for the cause of this continued unconsciousness. Perhaps…a fresh perspective is needed.”

It took Poppy a moment to register his words. “You’re not asking me, are you?”

“That would depend, of course, on how fresh you deem your perspective.”

She huffed. Sometimes Dumbledore reminded her of her great-grandfather, who’d been one of those Ravenclaws who couldn’t go without twisting every other sentence into a riddle. He’d died from drinking a full glass of Triple-Strength Toenail Refurbisher, thinking it was pumpkin juice.

“My perspective certainly isn’t _fresh_. I’ve been here for hours,” she said, failing to keep the grumpiness from her voice. “Besides, all my knowledge lies in Healing, as you very well know. Not whatever esoteric branch of magic this is.”

“Very true,” conceded Dumbledore. He set aside his book and waited.

Inevitably, Poppy humored the headmaster, feeling like a schoolgirl who’d been called to answer a trick question. Luckily, she’d actually managed to learn a thing or two in school, one of which was to always start with the facts: “There’s nothing wrong with him physically. Healing spells and potions treat him like a human, but he’s got about as much life in him as a brick.”

Dumbledore nodded as though she hadn’t already told him this before. “And the spell you used to determine this?”

“The Time-Past-Death Charm. Either he died more than a year before you brought him in or he was never alive to begin with.”

“The former is an interesting proposal,” mused Dumbledore. It always amazed her how he could turn her sarcastic responses into valid ideas. “Although I would like to think the Hogwarts staff would have noticed if one of their students were a zombie.”

“Well, we can rule out any kind of undead. They’re rather thick, I’ve been told, and Minerva swears this one’s the smartest in his year,” said Poppy, rolling her eyes.

She expected some kind of admonishment for gossiping about students (in her defence, it was all Minerva’s fault), but the headmaster simply stared into space, frowning at the far wall. Rude.

But then, like a switch had been flicked, Dumbledore’s eyes lit up and he sucked in a breath. “Thick. Of course. ‘Thick as a brick,’ I believe the saying goes.”

“Er,” said Poppy.

“A brick!”

And now Dumbledore was proper excited, his eyes twinkling in the dim lighting, even as Poppy tried and failed to see the relevance of bricks.

“I think you’re tired,” she said slowly.

“An astute observation, my dear,” said Dumbledore, looking about ready to award her points. “But answer me this: If we are to assume that a brick has no life, how does one heal a brick?”

In the span of two sluggish blinks, Poppy managed to follow his train of thought to its logical destination, and when she did, it rankled that she hadn’t thought of this four hours ago. She let out a sigh.

“Oh, bother. Is it really so simple?”

Dumbledore smiled and drew his wand. “Let us find out.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Oh, hey. Here, have a chapter. I might update again sometime this year. Or not. Who knows? It's 2020 after all.
> 
> Happy September 1, and thanks for reading!


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